ARLINGTON — The Rangers took a unique approach to getting Yu Darvish on the AL All-Star team Sunday.

It started with leaving Darvish off the roster.

The Rangers figured placing lefty Matt Harrison on the team and Darvish on the ballot for the 34th man gave them a chance to send both starters to Kansas City. All that had to happen afterward, was for Darvish (10-5, 3.59 ERA) to make a solid start Sunday, his only appearance during the five-day, online-only voting period, and then let his popularity in Japan take over.

If that was the mission, consider it a success despite the Rangers’ 3-1 loss to Oakland that ended their winning streak at five games. It also reduced the AL West lead back to 5 ½ games over Los Angeles.

In a game that started just about the time Tokyo was beginning its work week — which will likely include multiple visits to the MLB voting site by much of Japan’s baseball-loving populace — Darvish was perfectly solid. And, at times, spectacular.

“I felt good from the beginning,” Darvish said through an interpreter. “I even felt strong right until the end.”

He struck out at least one batter in each of the first six innings of a seven-inning outing and finished with 11 to tie the high for his 16-start career. Unlike his last couple of outings, he started off in crisp fashion, not allowing a hit the first time through the order. He pitched into the seventh or deeper for the eighth time and racked up his ninth quality start.

His biggest mistakes were a leadoff walk to Coco Crisp in the sixth with the score tied at 1-1, a pitch in the dirt later that inning that became a run-scoring wild pitch and a first-pitch fastball to Brandon Moss in the seventh that turned into a homer. They appeared, by no means, to be fatal flaws.

Then again, Washington didn’t count on his offense coming up short against Travis Blackley, who entered the game with two major league wins in eight years. The Rangers managed seven hits off Blackley and took themselves out of a game-changing rally in the sixth with three consecutive pop flies after a leadoff ground-rule double by No. 9 hitter Craig Gentry. Gentry’s ball hit off the wall, then the shoe of Oakland center fielder Yoenis Cespedes and then bounced over the wall.

Washington tried to get his player, who was already around second when the ball went over the wall, an extra base in a discussion with the umpiring crew, but came up empty. Ian Kinsler, Elvis Andrus and Josh Hamilton popped up in succession.

“We had some chances, but you have to give Blackley credit for keeping us from cashing them in,” Washington said.

And now it is up to fans, who may cast as many votes as they want online until 3 p.m. Thursday for Darvish or the other four pitchers — Kansas City’s Jonathan Broxton, Baltimore’s Jason Hammel, Chicago’s Jake Peavy or Los Angeles’ Ernesto Frieri — on the final man ballot.

“I think Yu has a pretty good chance of winning the vote,” Washington said after announcing the All-Star roster. “And I encourage fans to vote for him.”

That — and nothing that happened during the game — may have been his biggest strategic moment of the day. Washington used two of his “manager’s choices” for Rangers pitchers, Harrison and reliever Joe Nathan. He could have chosen Darvish over Harrison, but Harrison had one more start and one more win going into Sunday.

And, quite frankly, the odds of the low-key, low-profile Harrison winning a popular vote, seemed long compared to Darvish, a national hero in Japan.

“Well, you can steer it any way you like,” Washington said. “The bottom line is that all of them deserve to be there. They are All-Stars.”

Earlier in the week, Darvish expressed doubts, saying he didn’t think he was “worthy.”

On Sunday, he seemed completely unmoved by the possibility of becoming the eighth Ranger on the squad.

“Those other four guys are all good pitchers,” he said. “Just being among them is an honor. I’m aware the fans get to vote for the last spot. There’s nothing much I can say on that. I’ll stay quiet and see what happens.”

After all, he’s done his talking on the field.

Catch Evan Grant’s Ranger Reports all season on The Ticket (KTCK-AM 1310) at 2:35 p.m. Mondays with BaD Radio; 9:35 a.m. Tuesdays with The Musers and Wednesdays at 4:15 p.m. with The Hardline.

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